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My book with co-author Diane Lapp will be available in October 2016. Besides many resources, some of our colleagues and friends contributed to our chapter on specific disciplines.

A Special Offer for Readers of Literacy Beat from Guilford Press: Save 20% with Promotion Code 2E! Just click the link or the cover art to automatically have the discount applied in your cart. You may also enter the code 2E directly in the cart to receive the discount.

Meet some of our experts:

A great lineup of experts in teaching and in the disciplines contributed to chapter 2 with sections for many content areas and topics. Take a look!

Dr. Maria Grant is a Professor of Education, California State University at Fullerton working in the College of Education.

Dr. Dana L. Grisham is a retired professor in the Department of Teacher Education at CSU East Bay (Hayward) where she taught courses in literacy teacher preparation and in the graduate reading program.

Liz Jardine owns a design studio and is an artist in San Diego, California.

Dr. Denise Johnson is professor and director of the Literacy Leadership Program and Department Chair of Curriculum and Instruction at the College of William & Mary, Williamsburg, VA.

Dr. Linda Lungren, a music teacher for San Diego City Schools (elementary).

Stacy Miller teaches at Stuttgart High School (DoDEA) in Germany.

Dr. Stephen Mogge is an Associate Professor in the Graduate Reading Education Program at Towson University.

Dr. Barbara Moss is a professor of literacy education at San Diego State University, where she teaches courses at the credential and masters levels.

Dr. Donna Ogle is Professor Emeritus of Literacy Education at National Louis University (NLU), Chicago, IL.

Dr. Susan J. Pearson is an Associate Professor of History at Northwestern University in Evanston, IL.

Tim Peterson is a bass guitar specialist. He works in retail at Guitar Center in the Los Angeles area and is a member of the popular band, EverTheory.

Steve Sheinkin is the author of several award-winning nonfiction books for young adults: The Notorious Benedict Arnold: A True Story of Adventure, Heroism & Treachery; Bomb: The Race to Build–and Steal–the World’s Most Dangerous Weapon; and the Port Chicago 50.

Dr. W. David Scales is a professor and psychometrician in the Department of Psychology at Western Carolina University in Cullowhee, NC.

Javier Vaca is a teacher of social studies at Health Sciences High and Middle College, San Diego, CA.

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By Thomas DeVere Wolsey

Hey, who are you calling “lazy?” That’s what I thought when I first came upon the phrase, “Lazy User Model.” In this case, being lazy is not a value statement or judgment but rather a phenomenon that explains certain behaviors, particularly when technology is involved, that may permit the user to get on with the business of learning. Let’s explore that a little.

What is the Lazy User Model?

Remember the last time you wanted to upgrade your cell phone? One of the factors you likely considered was how much time you would need to spend to learn the features and affordances of your new phone. If you chose a phone that worked much as your old phone did, you demonstrated the principle of the Lazy User Model (Tétard & Collan opens as PDF, 2009). The theorists postulate that users attempting to solve a problem, such as obtain information or carry out a task, are limited in some ways and have a set of possible solutions against which to weigh the need and the limitations. They believe that users typically choose the solution that results in the least cost to them and still solves the problem. That is why they call the theory the “Lazy” User Model. You can see that in this case, being lazy may save on the overall investment of time, money, or other resources. Here is what that looks like in graphic form.

The Lazy User Model

Plug your need for a new cell phone into the graphic, and you will see how being lazy works for you. You need a new cell phone. The state that limits you includes the choice of phones your cell phone provider offers, your knowledge of the phone you already have and when your current plan expires allowing you to select a new phone. Your possible solutions (let’s say) include an iPhone and an Android. The least cost or lazy option for you is the type of phone you already have because you already know how to use most of the features. The cost in terms of time spent learning the features of the phone outweigh the choice to adopt (or “switch” as Tétard & Collan, 2009 call the action) the possibility of choosing a new brand of phone.

Being Lazy in Class

What does being lazy look like in class? More important, why would you want to allow your students to be lazy? In our present case, let’s change the title of the model from Lazy User to Lazy Classroom.

Here is a scenario from a project Dana, Linda, and I reported on Literacy Beat recently (here and here). We asked a group of fifth graders to learn science vocabulary through the Vocabulary Self-Collection Strategy Plus (VSS+) model. The students needed to solve the problem of creating the VSS+ entry by selecting images, creating an audio file, and writing a definition, among other things.

The need or problem: Create a VSS+ entry.

The state that creates the limitations: Use the tools assigned and that are available in the school computer lab. The students were further limited by the amount of time they had to complete the project before they were required to submit it.

The set of possible solutions thus includes choosing Thinglink or PowerPoint. Most of the students were familiar with PowerPoint but hadn’t used it, and none of the students were familiar at all with Thinglink.

The lowest cost or “lazy” solution for most students turned out to be PowerPoint because most of the students were familiar with the software. Some students did try Thinglink and created successful VSS+ entries because they were intrigued with the tool, and a few others started with Thinglink but switched back to the more familiar tool after experimenting with it.

Lazy Classroom Model

What are the Implications for the Lazy Classroom?

There are several things we might take away from the Lazy Student Model.

Being lazy can be a time saver that allows the students to concentrate on the task and not on the tool.

Being lazy might mean that students will not choose the best technology because they chose the tool they know instead of the best one for the task.

If students need to learn how to use a new-to-them technology, the will need support. Support could include direct instruction, a series of help or job aids, or access to a peer expert who is knowledgeable about the tool. Indeed, in the VSS+ project, we purposefully chose some students to become experts in working with sound files, selecting graphics, or designing graphic images using the drawing tools in PowerPoint, for example. Then, when other students needed assistance, we teachers directed the students to their expert peers to teach them what they needed to know just in time to put the technology to work.

What other implications for the Lazy Classroom Model occur to you? Are there examples you would like to share? Please use the comments section to post your thoughts.

The Teacher Education Research Study Group, or TERSG, is a professional learning community of the Literacy Research Association that sponsors research in the field of (you guessed it) teacher education related to literacy.

TERSG members consider the preparation of excellent literacy teachers to be both a professional and a personal priority. In addition, this study group provides an opportunity for educators to come together for further study of effective practices in literacy teacher education. In this post, I want to tell you a little bit about a longitudinal project that examined the pathways from teacher candidate to student teacher to novice teacher. This project is the work of a subset of the larger study group who have published many other articles and resources related to teacher education, as well.

The research team has changed members as personal and professional demands have changed over time, but the work has continued since we first started the three-phase project in 2009. The group has been incredibly productive, but one of the things that has come out of our work has been the opportunity to demonstrate that faculty members from small teaching colleges can work together to gather a substantial data set and mold that into multiple presentations and publications. In addition our little band of researchers, a subset of the larger study group, has strengthened friendships, as a result of this project.

In addition to face-to-face meetings at the annual Literacy Research Association conference, the researchers met frequently using technologies such as Skype, Google Hangouts, and webinar software. We stored and shared documents on Box.com, Google Drive, and occasionally in Dropbox. The Box.com secure site houses over 1154 discrete documents from raw data, to minutes of our meetings, to draft and final manuscripts.

This post will serve as a home base listing of the publications and presentations completed to date. We hope that our work will help inform the ongoing discussions about how best to prepare candidates as exemplary teachers of reading. Whenever possible, I have included a link to the presentation and publication resources, as well. The Wordle slide show, below, is drawn from descriptors of the teacher preparation programs that participated in the project.

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Literacy Beat asked colleague Sam Patterson to recommend an influencer from the Maker Movement. Sam responded immediately and asked Sylvia Libow Martinez to join Literacy Beat’s influencer post series. Sam writes, “Sylvia’s passion for empowering young people to change the world is matched only by her amazing understanding of how to create learning experiences that guide students to discover how the world works and the power they have to influence the world. Sylvia works in schools around the world to help teachers use hands-on experiences to support discovery-based learning. Sylvia helps educators realize how new technologies can help us achieve the classic goals of progressive pedagogy.”Here are our questions for Sylvia and her responses.

What tips or advice might you offer to teachers who want to be advocates for learning through literacy in the digital world?

Sylvia L. Martinez

I think that it’s important for teachers to keep an eye on what’s happening outside of school, not just in the digital world, but in the world at large. The Maker Movement, for example, is a trend that is going to change the world, possibly as much as the Industrial Revolution. It’s a trend that speaks to how people learn and solve problems using new technology-based devices and networks. The implications for education are immense, and watching the Maker Movement grow and become more mature can give educators insights into issues that the children they teach today will grapple with in the future. The rise of desktop manufacturing will eventually change industries worldwide – children with access to 3D printers and laser cutters can start to understand this today. The Internet of Things is in its infancy with such things as cars that text you when they need an oil change, but the implications are immense as more and more sophisticated technology becomes available. Why not put these technologies into student’s hands today so that they will be informed participants in control of these technologies, rather than passive consumers? Nicholas Negroponte, the founder of the MIT Media Lab says, “Bio is the new digital.” New advances in synthetic biology and programmable organic materials are going to change the world just like silicon chips did. How can we justify continuing to teach biology and chemistry as if this isn’t true?

Educators may feel hesitant in the face of these new technologies, because they weren’t around when they were in school, so it’s not always obvious that they belong in school. When Gary Stager, my co-author of Invent To Learn: Making, Tinkering, and Engineering in the Classroom and I lead professional development, we ask educators to take off their teacher hats and put on their learner hats. When teachers open themselves up to becoming learners again, it opens doors to new ideas and practices in the classroom.

I believe that literacy with technology is not simply using technology to read, write, or share information better. I have a much broader definition of technology literacy that revolves around making and doing. Just like traditional literacy, technology literacy should help students make sense of the world around them. It should allow people to express their ideas through mathematics, simulations, programming, and making physical things. If we open up school to the world that is continually changing, this definition of technology literacy will help students and teachers understand where they fit and how they can make the world a better place in the exciting days to come.

What significant event in your life changed the focus of your work?

Right out of college I was an aerospace engineer. I mostly worked with people who were a lot like me – good at school, mathematically and logically oriented. But when I moved to software game development, I met different kinds of engineers and programmers. Most of them did not have formal computer science degrees, many had not finished college, and a few had not even finished high school. Many of them were told – as early as middle school – that they couldn’t learn computers or take advanced science classes because they were “bad at math” – and “bad at math” typically meant they were bad at doing what teachers told them to do.

I can assure you these folks were not “bad at math” – the math involved in making computer games is beautiful and fascinating yet we teach none of it in school. They were some of the most original thinkers and problem-solvers I’ve ever met.

As I started to specialize in educational games, I found that learning about learning fascinated me – and I earned a masters degree in education. The more I learned, the more I wondered why we are we so intent on math and science curriculum that favors kids who have that magic blend of compliance and smarts (like me), but relentlessly weeds out kids who don’t fit in that narrow slice of humanity. My colleagues who became game developers in spite of being rejected by school were the lucky ones, but there are thousands of children every year who slip completely out of that famous leaky STEM pipeline – people who could be the innovative problem solvers the world needs – but instead we bore them to death, insult their intelligence, ignore their gifts, and drive them away.

A couple of years ago I started going to Maker Faires and learning more about the maker movement. I found a brilliant combination of technology, whimsy, engineering, art, and science. But talk to makers and you will find that many are just like my gamer friends for whom school was not a good place to learn. How sad is that?

And when I talked to parents at Maker Faires, they would say things like, “look at my kid, programming, building robots …. I can see they are learning. But every night I have to pull them away from that and we cry over worksheets. I don’t understand!”

And these parents are right, it’s NOT UNDERSTANDABLE that we have turned science and math into worksheets. We know this is wrong. We know how learning happens – it happens when children have amazing experiences that challenge them and reward their natural curiosity about the world. Piaget said, “knowledge is a consequence of experience” – and that’s echoed by every educational giant from Maria Montessori to John Dewey to Seymour Papert. Why have we strayed so far from these insights?

So my mission today is to help schools find ways to bring hands-on, minds-on activities into the classroom that steer children towards the powerful ideas found not just in STEM fields, but in every subject area. Our book, Invent To Learn: Making, Tinkering, and Engineering in the Classroom, is an attempt to situate the powerful new opportunities found in the maker movement in good educational practice and pedagogy.

Sylvia is a keynote and featured speaker at national and international education and technology conferences in areas ranging from the Maker Movement in education, student leadership, digital citizenship, games in education, project-based and inquiry-based learning with technology, gender issues in education, and new advances in science, math, engineering and technology (STEM) education.

For the previous ten years, Sylvia was President of Generation YES, a global non-profit evangelizing technology-based student service-learning. Prior to this, Sylvia was an executive at several software and video game publishers, overseeing product development, design, and programming, spearheading hundreds of software releases, video games, and educational websites.

As a Senior Scientist and electrical engineer for Magnavox Research Labs, Sylvia designed high frequency receiver systems and navigation software for the launch of the GPS satellite navigation system. She holds a masters in educational technology from Pepperdine University, and a bachelor’s degree in engineering from UCLA.

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Don Leu is a colleague, mentor, and friend to the Literacy Beat bloggers, and he has consistently influenced our research since we met him. Don and the New Literacies Research Lab always have something innovative in the pipeline to lead our thinking. In this post, we are very pleased to introduce Don to you. We asked Don to tell us about the ORCA project, Online Research and Comprehension Assessment. ORCA addresses the need for assessments and resources for online inquiry and research in our schools. Read Don’s response to learn more about ORCAs and find the professional development resources that support it, all provided as a public service.

Don Leu

What is Orca?

Central to our students’ success in life will be the ability to conduct inquiry online in order to learn (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development [OECD], 2011; Rideout, Foehr, & Roberts, 2010) What does this process look like and how might we determine our students’ ability in this area so we can prepare appropriate instruction? The ORCA Project (http://www.orca.uconn.edu) recently developed eight authentic assessments to measure online inquiry skills in science (human body systems). The assessments are now freely available online. A video describing these assessments is also available (see below).

The assessments appear in two formats: ORCA-Multiple Choice (or ORCA-Closed) and ORCA-Simulation. In each, students conduct online research about an important question in science and responses are largely auto-scored. Both formats have demonstrated acceptably high levels of reliability and validity, though the ORCA-Simulation has demonstrated a 10% higher level of reliability, compared to ORCA-Multiple Choice (See Leu, et al., 2014).

Our research with representative state samples of 1,300 students in Maine and Connecticut shows that, on average, 7th graders only perform successfully on about half of the skills required in online research, suggesting that they are not fully prepared in this area. It also shows students are especially weak in critical evaluation skills and communication skills. (See Leu, et al., 2015)

You are welcome to use these assessments for instruction, assessment, or professional development. They may be accessed online without cost. A professional development module is also available.

Meet Don:

Donald J. Leu is the John and Maria Neag Endowed Chair in Literacy and Technology at the University of Connecticut. He holds a joint appointment in Curriculum and Instruction and Educational Psychology in the Neag School of Education. A graduate of Michigan State, Harvard, and Berkeley, he is an international authority on literacy education, especially the new skills and strategies required to read, write, and learn with Internet technologies and the best instructional practices that prepare students for these new literacies. Don directs the New Literacies Research Lab in the Neag School of Education. He is a member of the Reading Hall of Fame, Past President of the Literacy Research Association, and a former member of the Board of Directors of the International Literacy Association.

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Students Use Language in the Sciences

The Literacy in the Disciplines Interview Project

Because what students do with language as they learn about and through any given discipline should be the end result of our work in disciplinary literacy, we share this example of student work in science. In this video newscast, students Garrett and Ben demonstrate their understanding of the language of science, particularly physics, as they explain the principles of matter and antimatter. Note the precise use of the language of science in their presentation. Watch this video to see them in action.

Josh Lawrence at the University of California, Irvine, shared this video about reading a graph like a scientist with us. We hope you’ll find it useful:

We invited Dr. Linda Lungren, a music teacher, pianist, composer, and choral conductor to interview Tim Peterson, bassist for the band, Everytheory, in Los Angeles CA regarding the literacy demands of working in the music industry. Download Evertheory’s music at freedownload.evertheory.net/ and visit the band’s website at www.evertheory.com/. Listen to this podcast of Linda’s interview with Tim.

Our colleague, Josh Lawrence at the University of California, Irvine, shared this video on a disciplinary approach to reading sheet music, as well.